


Your Name Has Echoed In My Mind

by thelilacfield



Category: Glee
Genre: First Love, M/M, Merpeople, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-09
Updated: 2014-05-09
Packaged: 2018-01-24 03:41:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,070
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1590389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelilacfield/pseuds/thelilacfield
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's traditional for richer families to gift their children with supernaturals on their sixteenth birthday. What Blaine gets is so much more than a pet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Your Name Has Echoed In My Mind

Blaine blinks his eyes open when he hears the butler’s reedy serenade of  _"Happy birthday dear Blaine,"_ and smiles up at the grey-haired man as he sets his breakfast tray down on his nightstand, adding Blaine’s preferred three spoonfuls of sugar to his coffee and stirring them in. “Good morning sir, how does it feel to be one step closer to New York?” he asks cheerfully, and Blaine grins at the reminder that he’ll only spend two more years stuck in Ohio. “Your mother asked me to inform you that your present is waiting downstairs. You’re to go down to claim it once you’ve eaten and changed.”

After he’s finished his caringly assembled breakfast and dressed himself in his favourite outfit, Blaine pads downstairs in his shiny shoes to find two men standing by the water tank built into the side of the house, the window into it from the lounge lit up. As he watches, the two men grunt and heave the metal box between them upside-down with a great gush of water, and a merman tumbles into the bottom of the tank, eyes scared and pressing himself back against the wall of the tank.

"Good morning, darling," Lillian says, pressing a kiss to each of Blaine’s cheek and sweeping a hand out to display the tank. "This tank has been in our house for years, and yet we’ve never used it, and now it’s my perfect boy’s sixteenth birthday I’ve decided to bequeath the ultimate status symbol on him. Fairies, nymphs, werewolves, vampires, those are a dime a dozen. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to capture and transport a merman and still keep it in the perfect condition this one is in?"

Blaine steps close to the glass and looks in at the merman, curled against the back wall and staring at them with wide eyes, glistening a mingled canvas of green and blue and grey like the temperamental sea. His skin is pale as marble, stretching out between his webbed fingers and sliding down into his silvery tail, shining in the spotlights. Blaine notices the long, sharp nails and the fangs behind his lips, but all he sees is beauty, and his tone is reverent when he says, “Thank you.”

"Now remember, you must care for him and keep him healthy, or we’ll be marked as unfit to host supernaturals," his mother warns, petting the back of his head as he presses his hands against the glass and leans closer. "He can’t speak English, but in time he will learn. We can have his claws and fangs removed if he proves hostile, but for now he seems meek enough. Keep his tank full and remember to let in the shoals of fish every few days to keep him entertained. He’ll adjust."

* * *

 

Lillian could not be happier to have such a rare and revered hybrid swimming in a tank on her own grounds. Endless parties are thrown, spotlights shimmering on the tank, and she smiles and laughs and pretends to be modest when people praise the beauty of her specimen. But the merman is shy, and sometimes oddly savage, bearing his fangs and slashing his claws at the glass window, and other times pressing himself against the back wall, eyes wide and panicked, tail flicking nervously at the water.

"Good morning," Blaine greets the merman cheerfully, tipping a bucket of fish into the tank and watching his eyes light up as he chases the fish around the tank, the water turned pale blue-grey in the light of the dawn. "How are you today?" The merman looks up at Blaine with an expression that say  _Are you kidding me?_  and Blaine smiles softly. “Yeah, I guess being kept like this isn’t the easiest. I could ask my mom to expand the tank.” He shakes his head, holding a squirming fish in one hand, and Blaine looks down at him. “Do you want a companion? Another merperson?” A far more vigorous shake of the head. “A name, maybe? Would a name make you feel better?”

The merman rears up out of the water like a seal, dark hair slicked against his skull, and gestures at Blaine, raking at the pebbles scattered around the edges of the tank. As Blaine watches, he moves the round, smooth stones into a word:  _KURT_. “Kurt?” he asks, and the boy nods eagerly, smiling. “Is that your name? Kurt?”

The boy looks up at Kurt with his sea-storm eyes, and points a sharp claw at him. His voice doesn’t come out as Blaine might’ve imagined it, but high and clear, a musical voice. “Blaine.”

"Yes, that’s my name!" Blaine says encouragingly, and smiles at the boy. "I’m Blaine. You’re Kurt."

The boy looks unimaginably proud of himself as he recites, “Kurt, Blaine,” pointing at himself then Blaine. Then he looks down at the tank, and his expression changes. “Sad,” he mumbles, pillowing his chin on his arms as he sweeps them up onto the edge of the tank, and Blaine looks down at the stones.

"I know," he replies quietly, and Kurt looks at him with curious eyes. "I know it’s difficult to live like this. But you’re not a human. You’re a pet."

Kurt hisses, his eyes going to angry slits, his fangs bared, and wheels back into the water, away from Blaine. And Blaine crosses his legs beneath him and sits looking down into the tank, chastising himself over and over again for upsetting Kurt just when it seemed they might begin to bond.

* * *

 

It’s become a habit of Blaine’s, to sit by the tank as the sun rises and talk quietly to Kurt. He dangles his bare feet in the water, and sometimes Kurt runs his gentle fingers over his toes, his rough heels and the fine bones of his ankles. Despite his claws and his fangs, Blaine is confident that Kurt would never hurt him. The breaches between them that have happened with each misstep have been healed, and Kurt understands every word he says.

"I know I shouldn’t say so," he says one morning, watching the rising sun begin to blaze across the ground, striping the drying grass with the shadows of slender trees. "I have friends and a loving family. I’m surrounded by positivity. But sometimes I feel lonely." Wiggling his toes beneath the water, he smiles as Kurt stops swirling around in the depths of the tank and surfaces, heaving himself half out of the water to be closer to Blaine. "I don’t know, Kurt. Sometimes I just want someone to love me, you know?"

"Love Blaine," Kurt says softly, and Blaine grins and nods encouragingly.

"That’s right, honey," he says sweetly. "I want someone to love me."

"No!" Kurt protests, shaking his head vehemently. His forehead creases and his lips purse and he seems to struggle his next few words out. "Kurt love Blaine." He looks up from beneath his dark, clumped-together eyelashes and asks, "Blaine love Kurt?" His fingers curve over Blaine’s hand, cold and wet, and he smiles slowly. "We can…kiss?"

"Are you trying to tell me you love me?" he asks softly, and Kurt nods eagerly. "You’re in love with me?" Another nod. And it crashes over him like a breaking wave: the reason he loves sitting out with Kurt, the reason just a glance into his tank when he gets home makes him feel at peace, the reason that seeing Kurt look sad and shy makes a small part of him crumble away. He’s in love with Kurt.

Sliding his fingers between Kurt’s, leaning down to smell the salt in his hair and see his bright eyes up close, Blaine whispers, “I love you too.” The hand Kurt doesn’t have entwined with Blaine’s own reaches up, a finger tracing over his cheek in a decidedly human gesture, running over his lips and then wrapping around his chin. That’s when Blaine can’t help himself any more, and leans slowly down until their lips meet.

Blaine goes into the kiss already overwhelmed. Kurt’s lips are soft, warmer than he expected, and he tastes like wind and rain and salt. His touch is so gentle, so afraid, that even when Blaine presses closer, hand straying into Kurt’s hair, he still holds back. “Kiss me more,” Blaine whispers, and it seems to make something inside Kurt break.

The water barely ripples when Kurt tugs Blaine down, but Blaine still feels safe. They’re sharing breaths as they kiss, and with Kurt’s arms around him Blaine knows he’s safe. Kurt isn’t stupid, he’ll get him to the surface if he can’t breathe. The tank isn’t very deep anyway. And it’s so wonderful, being entwined with Kurt, that he never wants it to end.

A muffled scream makes Blaine jerk away, his lungs tight with the need for oxygen, and all the breath goes from him when he sees his mother standing in front of the tank, her eyes wide with shock and fright. Tearing himself out of Kurt’s arms, Blaine swims up to the surface, gulping down air and scrambling out of the tank.

"Mom, it wasn’t what it looked like!" he yells as he bursts into the house, dripping water everywhere and slipping on the polished floorboards. "Mom! Mom, Kurt would never hurt me!"

"Animal control?" And at those words, Blaine’s blood runs cold and his heart skips a beat. His eyes go to Kurt, pressing his hands against the wall of the tank, gazing sadly at him, wondering what he did wrong. "I have a situation with my pet. A merman. Yes, he tried to drown my son. Could you pick him up as soon as possible?"

"Mom, he wasn’t trying to hurt me!" Blaine yelps as she clatters the phone down, tears springing to his eyes. "I kissed him, okay? I kissed him and it got heated and he just pulled me in. I swear, he would never hurt me!"

"Blaine, darling, maybe you think that, but he’s playing with your mind," his mother says gently. "He kissed you to trick you, and he pulled you in because he hates being trapped in there. He’s savage, and I can’t have him around my sweet baby boy."

"I’m sixteen years old, I’m not a child!" Blaine yells, and jumps when he hears the sound of an engine on the end of the road. "Don’t take him away from me! He’s more than just a pet! I love him!"

"No you don’t, baby," his mother says, and the way she says is almost patronising enough that Blaine wants to slap her. "You’re just deluded. When he’s gone, you’ll realise he was just manipulating you."

And she leaves the room, directing the men in their discreet beige uniforms as they grab Kurt with hooks and ropes, tying him up in chains as Blaine watches, screaming himself hoarse for them to stop. Kurt looks so frightened, he doesn’t understand, and the way he’s staring at Blaine is a plea for help.

Blaine shoots out of the door like a rocket as the men are forcing Kurt into a tank no matter how much he squirms to get free, tears sliding down his cheeks as he sobs, “Please don’t take him, please! He wasn’t trying to hurt me, he would never, please don’t take Kurt away from me! Please, I love him!”

"In serious cases of assault like this, it would be breaking the law to not take him in," one of the men says, slamming the lid down on Kurt even as he struggles against the chains, tail flicking frantically at the water.

"He didn’t assault me!" Blaine screams, ducking past his mother and scrabbling at the lid of the tank, pushing it off far enough to look down at Kurt, whose distress only seems to increase when he sees the tears on Blaine’s cheeks and hears the crack in his voice. "Tell them, honey. Tell them you didn’t assault me! Tell them I kissed you first! Tell them we love each other!"

But Kurt’s voice is hoarse, and he just keeps repeating, “Blaine…love….Blaine!” in an increasingly distressed voice as one of the men yanks Blaine away from him and the other locks the lid securely down, even when Blaine screams for them to get away.

They drive Kurt away in the back of their truck, leaving Blaine running down the driveway in its dust, screaming, “Kurt!” until the truck is out of sight and he falls to his knees in the dirt, curling on himself and sobbing even when he has no more tears left to cry.

* * *

 

The tank is empty. Only dust rests there now, the wind whistling through the emptiness. Blaine sits there in the evenings, watching the sunset through the glass, remembering when the water would turn orange and Kurt would splash around, his fingers and fins brushing against Blaine’s ankles. Now he’s gone, and Blaine won’t get to see him again.

Of course, it’s Artie that comes forward with a plan. He talks about a fairy girl who became his friend when he was young, but was taken in by authorities because she lost control of her magic. Blaine is absorbed in his story as he recounts how he tracked her down through a series of digital barriers and, with the help of his cousin who campaigns viciously for supernaturals to be given better rights, broke her out of the holding cell she was in and installed her in a small house beyond the reach of anyone who might try to harm her.

So Blaine takes his laptop and begins to work his way through government websites, making accounts using a fake email address and a fake name. It takes almost a month, when his mother has started talking about finding him a new pet, something lower-maintenance than a merman, but eventually he manages to track Kurt down as  **id number: 1067854** , locked up in a holding cell known as McKinley on the outskirts of Lima.

Sam and Artie and Jake all get in on his plan. Artie is going to help with all the technical barriers, disabling alarms and motion sensors and finding codes and keycards, and Sam and Jake are the muscle of the operation. In the back of Jake’s truck is a tank, small and shallow, but with enough water that Kurt can survive in there until they get him to the safe house they’ve found - Jan and Liz, an elderly couple who have been campaigning for equal rights for supernaturals for many years and are willing to hide Kurt in their pool for a while.

It all goes smoothly, much to Blaine’s surprise. For a prison, there are very few guards around, and they’re mostly able to slip past them. Jake parks right beneath the cell where Kurt is being held, so they’ll be able to slip out through the fire escape and drive away before the breakout registers on the systems.

It’s amazing, the fantastic creatures the government has decided to imprison. They pass an unusually dark-skinned vampire sharpening long red nails, a banshee doodling stars in the dust on her cell floor, a blonde fairy flying in the small circles the chain around her ankle will allow her to and a mohawked genie scowling in the corner of his cell. Finally, Blaine hears the sound of water lapping at glass and spins on his heel to see Kurt’s tank.

"Kurt!" It comes out quiet, but Blaine can’t help the way his heart skips a beat as he rushes to Kurt, getting as close as the motion sensors and bars and alarms will allow him. Kurt looks weak and ill and sad, the water around him murky, but his face lights up when he sees Blaine, and he swims up to the glass, pressing his hands longing against the wall between them. "Oh God, honey, I am so sorry. We’ll get you out of there. Artie?"

"Almost there," Artie says through gritted teeth, hitting buttons on the keypad at random until a buzz sounds and the lights on the motion sensors blink off, the bars drawing away with a screech. "Oh Jesus, shut up, you mechanical piece of shit!"

Blaine darts through the door as soon as the bars have finished folding back, and looks at the structure of the tank. It’s small, far smaller than what Kurt had living with him, and there’s pod with a circular hole attached to the side. Obviously where they drop creatures off. Now Kurt is swimming frantically at the hole, pushing his hands against the glass, and Blaine tugs and tugs at the handle until a lid swings back, water rushing out and splashing over them as Kurt surges out and lands heavily on the ground, flopping around and gasping like a fish.

They have to get out quickly, but Blaine can’t help the sweet surge of love when he lifts Kurt into his arms and the merman curls into him, seeking out protection. Artie has to wait while Blaine runs down the fire escape and leaves Sam and Jake to install Kurt in the tank, then runs back up to help Artie down. By the time the banshee starts wailing out the loss, they’re already turning recklessly onto the road and shooting away into the night.

Blaine climbs into the back of the truck to sit with Kurt, opening the lid of his tank so they can talk while allowing Kurt to breathe. “I love you,” he says, at a loss for any other words, amazed their heist was actually successful.

"I love you too," Kurt says in his musical voice, and he smiles at Blaine’s shock. "My friends there taught me your language. I wanted to speak with you and thank you for everything you showed me." He looks down, away from Blaine, and says, "My mother died at the hands of a human. She was dragged away from me in a fishing net and killed. And when they caught me with their tridents, I feared the same would happen to me. But you saved me, Blaine." His fingers slide between Blaine’s, and Blaine shuffles closer. "Stay with me."

"Always," Blaine promises, and leans down to press a kiss to Kurt’s cool, salty lips as they continue to bump away from that horror, into a future together in the best way they can be.


End file.
